I've written before about one Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III, formerly full-time Attorney General of the United States and part-time Keebler Elf. Besides being named after two Confederate heroes (this guy and this guy), let us not forget that Sessions was a formerly failed nominee to the fe...
I get a fair amount of calls from people who are either arrested or given a summons for possession of marijuana. Many times on those calls I get a potential client on the other line expressing disbelief that marijuana possession is still illegal in Louisiana or expressing to me a desire to “f...
I had a somewhat negative recently experience with a group of bounty hunters, or (as they like to call themselves), “bail recovery agents” or “fugitive recovery agents.” I'm not going to get too into what happened, but it should suffice to say that the bounty hunters arrested my client and too...
I have written about this before, but with Election Day less than a month away, I thought it bore repeating. This fall, Louisiana voters will have the ability to right a historic wrong. In forty-eight other states (Oregon being the other lone exception) and in federal courts across the countr...
Recently, there's been a lot of talk in the media about being persons (particularly men) being “guilty until proven innocent.” People said and wrote we were applying that standard to Brett Kavanaugh. The president has even suggested that this is “a very scary time for young men in America.” ...
Earlier this week, Bill Cosby was sentenced to three to ten years in a Pennsylvania state prison. It was a stunning fall from grace for “America's Dad.” What I was more interested in was that Cosby was ordered to pay the state $43,000 for the “costs of prosecution” in addition to a $25,000 fi...
Last month, Paul Manafort (Donald Trump's former campaign manager) and Michael Cohen (Trump's former personal lawyer) were recently adjudicated guilty in separate federal criminal cases. Manafort, who was facing a second, and potentially more serious, federal trial then pleaded guilty to those...
Think back to the summer of 2006 for a minute. Where were you? I know it's hard. I know it's a dozen years ago. I know your head is clogged by malted hops and (possibly) bong resin, if I may be so bold as to quote Tommy Boy. On this day twelve years ago, I was interning in Division “A” of ...
Not all of my stories and blog posts have to be serious. Take this one for example. Apparently, Jeffery Day, of Centreville, MS, a guard at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola thought it would be a good idea to try and smuggle drugs into Louisiana's only maximum-security prison. He wa...
Now that Oregon State won the College World Series, I've seen a fresh batch of stories on one of their star pitchers, Luke Heimlich. Heimlich was on the cover of Sports Illustrated recently and he's currently a hot topic on sports radio. Mr. Heimlich has been one of college baseball's best pi...
Somebody sent me an article recently from a blog called The Root, which was founded in part by famed Harvard University professor Henry Louis Gates. The headline immediately caught my eye – “Evilest White Woman On Earth.” The “evilest woman” referred to is a federal prosecutor named Terra Mor...
I read an enlightening article recently on Above the Law, which for those who don't know, is an excellent legal blog and has been for years. The article specifically dealt with Harvey Weinstein's prosecution in New York State for rape (he entered a not guilty plea to all charges earlier this w...
My previous post addressed inmates divulging information over the phone. This post will address inmates divulging information to other inmates. It is extremely important that an innate not divulge information to any other inmate. Anybody that is in jail or prison has one goal that exceeds al...
When meeting a client for the first time that's incarcerated, I always tell them two things. The first thing is to not talk about their case with any of their fellow inmates. You never know who's going to sell you out to help their own case. Second, I always tell people “FOR GOD'S SAKE, DON'...
Currently, there are only two states that allow for non-unanimous jury verdicts in criminal cases. One is Oregon, which requires a vote of 11 out of 12 to convict in most felony cases (but not cases that are punishable by life in prison). The other is Louisiana. In certain felony cases, we ha...
I've obviously been slacking in my blog posts. I wanted to expand on the previous post I made about what to do when you are stopped by police officers. Here, I will offer some suggestions on how to treat, address, and otherwise “deal with” police officers. Please note that this list is not in...
I'd like to offer a slightly more “real-world” tilt to this post and to discuss my opinions as to what you should (and should not) do if stopped by the police. After all, you don't want to end up like the guy above, right? There's a ton more I could say about this - but I did want to share th...
Obviously, I've been a little remiss in the past couple of months regarding making blog posts. Nonetheless, one of my new year's resolutions is to do a blog post at least every other week. I have some good topics in mind, but I wanted to start the year with some interesting links/stories that...
I had fully intended to finish up my post on campus sexual assault this week. However, the recent tragic massacre in Las Vegas made me rethink my blog post. Of course, after every mass shooting of this type, the conversation inevitably turns to gun control. I try to keep this blog timely, so...
I'd like to spend a couple of posts discussing a hot-button (but sensitive) topic: sexual assault on college campuses. I plan to discuss how colleges have changed their reporting of student-made sexual assault claims, the procedural safeguards for those accused, the recent “backlash” against t...
It's been awhile since I drafted a blog post. My apologies, I've been extremely busy over the past month or so. But, I'm back, so here we go: As previously discussed in this blog, Louisiana is currently the incarceration capital of the United States. The United States is the incarceration cap...
The 2017 session of the Louisiana Legislature has come and gone. As per usual, they did not get a whole lot done, and even required two extraordinary sessions to even on a budget. The Legislature did send more than 430 bills to the governor, though (of which 8 were vetoed for various reasons)...
Last week we examined voir dire (aka jury selection) and the state's case-in-chief. Now we examine the defense's case-in-chief. In a VERY general sense, the procedure of the defense's case is the same of that of the state, but the parties are reversed. If the defense is so inclined after the...
Many people have preconceived notions about how the criminal justice system works. Some of those notions are not accurate. Below, I detail three misconceptions that I often see in my practice and the reality behind those misconceptions Misconception: Assault and battery are the same offens ...
Recently, Orleans Parish's elected criminal magistrate judge Harry Cantrell has come under some serious fire from civil rights organizations for his bond setting practices. The MacArthur Justice Center, a prominent public interest law firm dedicated to advocating for human rights and social ju...
